Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Summer Salad Recipe: Pressed Salad


With summer just around the corner, I like to share one of my favorite summer salad recipes, "Pressed Salad."  Before you start associating your ironing board with curly leaf lettuce, let me explain!
This is a cooking tool called a "salad press" or "pickle press."  You can find them online or in a local Asian, Korean or Japanese market.  A pressed salad is not cooked at all, yet it is not just like a raw salad because it has been processed by pressing it in some sea salt for a period of time.  This is actually a pickling method, only it is done for a very short time to make an ever-so-lightly pickled or pressed dish.

To press salad, you can choose things like lettuce, cabbage, carrots, cucumbers, radishes or anything that can be cut very small or that is "press-able."  Chunks of cauliflower or broccoli, for instance, are not very press-able.  I like to use three to five ingredients for a pressed salad.
Here's a simple pressed salad using cabbage, carrots, cucumbers, red onion and parsley.
1. Cut the cabbage into thin bite-size strips.  Cut the carrots into thin matchsticks.  Cut the cucumbers in half.  Remove the seeds with a spoon if you wish. I don't remove seeds because I like my foods to be "whole."  I also don't peel my cucumbers because I buy organic and use the skins of my veggies.  Cut the half-cucumbers into slices.  Cut the red onion into thin slices.  Cut the parsley into small pieces.
2.  Put all the cut veggies into the salad press.  Add sea salt and start mixing the salad around with a utensil, chopsticks or--I just use my hands.  You will add enough sea salt to make the veggies start sweating or glistening.  The salt is pulling some of the water out of the vegetables.  Don't worry, you'll rinse the excess salt out later.
3.  Tighten the press down so the veggies are snug and the pressure of the press is helping to get the water out.  If you don't have a salad press, just use a flat plate and a weight such as a heavy jar or a brick or rock.  They will do the same thing.
4.  The time you will press the veggies will depend on what veggies you use.  If you press a lettuce salad, it will only take 20-30 minutes and lettuce needs very little salt to "process" in the press.  With cabbage it will take longer--an hour or more.  You can decide how "pressed" you want your salad to be by how you like the taste and texture.  The thinner you cut your veggies, the less time they will take to press.
5.  When the salad is done pressing, you will see excess water in the press and you should drain that off.  Then rinse the salad itself in cool water and gently squeeze out the excess water by hand before serving.  You can serve the pressed salad with a dressing or not.  I usually don't feel it needs one.

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